WhatsApp Banned For House Of Representatives Staffers

The House of Representatives will no longer allow staffers to have WhatsApp on their government devices, according to a report from Axios on Monday. 

In an email viewed by Axios, the ban on Meta’s popular encrypted messaging app has been labeled by the Office of Cybersecurity as “high-risk” due to the “lack of transparency in how it protects user data, absence of stored data encryption, and potential security risks.”

“House staff are NOT allowed to download or keep the WhatsApp application on any House device, including any mobile, desktop, or web browser versions of its products,” the email adds, also stating that if staffers have WhatsApp on their government device, they will be "contacted to remove it."

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In response to the news, Meta spokesperson Andy Stone disagreed with the decision "in the strongest possible terms,” citing regular use of the app by House staffers and the platform’s reliable security measures. 

“Messages on WhatsApp are end-to-end encrypted by default, meaning only the recipient and not even WhatsApp can see them,” Stone said, calling this “a higher level of security than most apps on the CAO’s approved list that do not offer that protection.”

While the Office of Cybersecurity listed Microsoft Teams, Wickr, Signal, iMessage and FaceTime as acceptable alternatives to WhatsApp, Meta remains insistent on restoring WhatsApp’s place in the House. 

WhatsApp’s ban in the House follows TikTok’s erasure on government devices earlier this year, as well as restrictions on the use of the free version of OpenAI’s ChatGPT. 

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